


Praising a Name

by SugarsweetRomantic



Category: Timeless (TV 2016)
Genre: Essays, Gen, Imported, Religion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-01
Updated: 2018-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-15 11:07:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29807463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SugarsweetRomantic/pseuds/SugarsweetRomantic
Summary: An essay I wrote on Lucy Preston's possible religious conviction, imported from my now-deleted tumblr.





	Praising a Name

# Praising a Name

_An observation of and opinion on the possible religious conviction of Lucy Preston._

When I first started watching Timeless, I did the equivalent of liveblogging my thoughts in messages to @letmetellyouaboutmyfeels, also known under her pen name Madsthenerdygirl. On one of those nights, I complained about a certain recurring factor and, as it turns out, I'm unwilling to let the topic go. So please, grab a seat, get some snacks, and do feel welcome to join me on this hill I've apparently decided to die on as I take the next few paragraphs to try and convince you of my biggest Timeless headcanon: Lucy Preston is Jewish. [1]

Now, to properly explain this headcanon and the reasoning behind it, I should explain how we got here. I had watched the first three episode of season one and had arrived at 01×04,  Party at Castle Varlar . For a quick reminder, this is the episode where the team travels to Nazi Germany and meet Ian Fleming. The moment I realised what they were suggesting they were about to do, I began grumbling about it in my messages, and sent: “They're seriously sending an American, a man of colour and a woman who might as well be Jewish into Nazi Germany and pretending it would be fine?” With her dark hair, frail build and without identification papers, Lucy would be seen as a possible Jew almost immediately, putting her in a stupidly ridiculous amount of danger of getting arrested and deported - or worse. 

In the beginning, this was just a vague comment on an actress’ appearance in a show I had only just started to watch, but as it went on and I became more invested in the characters, this idea began to evolve to the point where I now truly see it as a viable possibility. There are a few reasons behind this conviction. 

##  Etymology of the Family Names

First of all, Lucy’s biological ancestry consist of mainly Hebrew names. Ethan Cahill and Benjamin Cahill both have Hebrew given names, of which the former comes from אֵיתָן ('Eitan) meaning "solid, enduring, firm", and the latter is derived from בִּנְיָמִין (Binyamin) which means "son of the south" or "son of the right hand", from the roots בֵּן (ben) meaning "son" and יָמִין (yamin) meaning "right hand, south". It should be noted that ‘Cahill’ in itself isn't a Hebrew surname, but an Irish one, and that ‘Preston’ is Old English. What is much more interesting to look at though, is the name of David Rittenhouse and his legacy. It shall be of no surprise that ‘David’ is a name as Jewish as they come, stemming from the Hebrew name דָּוִד (Dawid), which was derived from Hebrew דּוֹד (dod) meaning "beloved" or "uncle". ‘John’, the name of his son that Lucy prevents Garcia Flynn from killing in 01×10,  The Capture of Benedict Arnold , is also Jewish, from the Hebrew name יוֹחָנָן (Yochanan) meaning "G-d [2] is gracious". That is not the reason this particular name intrigues me so. No, I am more interested in his surname: ‘Rittenhouse’. 

At first glance, this name doesn't sound particularly Jewish, but there's a short tale related to it that shows the connection. ‘Rittenhouse’ is the anglicised form of the German surname ‘Rittinghaus’, which was a habitational name from a farm near Altena, Westphalia. Now, currently, the Jewish community makes up about 0.2% of the entirety of the Westphalian population, which is not a very significant amount. However, before the Holocaust, Westphalia had a much higher amount of Jewish inhabitants. This was mainly due to the legacy of the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which largely ended the European wars on religion that were fought in the sixteenth and seventeenth century, but I digress. This increases the likelihood of ‘Rittenhouse’ having been a Jewish family name. 

##  His Real-Life Counterpart

The suggestion that the Rittenhouse family indeed originated in Germany is supported even further by the real-life history behind the character of David Rittenhouse, who was an actual astronomer, inventor and clockmaker born in Germantown, Pennsylvania in 1732. Germantown, currently a neighbourhood in Northwest Philadelphia, was founded on October 6, 1683, by German settlers. Many Jewish German families married into non-Jewish ones to escape antisemitism - which was not as much of an issue in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century western Europe as it was during the Second World War, but nevertheless a significant factor. Rittenhouse himself married a woman by the (English) name of Eleanor Coulston, who bore him two daughters, Ester and Elizabeth, before dying from complications during the birth of their third unnamed child. He later remarried, this time to a woman called Hannah Jacobs, by whom he had but one child, an unnamed baby which died in childbirth. By now it should be of no surprise to you when I tell you that all these names - ‘Ester’, ‘Elizabeth’, ‘Hannah’ and ‘Jacobs’ - are all Jewish. They stem from, respectively, הֲדַס (hadas), אֱלִישֶׁבַע (Elisheva), חַנָּה (Channah) and יַעֲקֹב (Ya'aqov), further reinforcing the assumption that the Rittenhouse family is of Jewish German origins.

##  Cultural Aspects

If my entire hypothesis would be supported only by etymology and geographics, it would not be much of a strong hypothesis at all. Luckily, there is more to it than that, namely the behaviour that Lucy exhibits throughout the series. She is never seen observing Christian holidays, nor is she shown practicing a religion or struggling with her faith in the ways Denise Christopher and Garcia Flynn are depicted, observing Hinduism and Roman Catholicism respectively. Besides this, Lucy dresses fairly modestly - unless the time period asks for more revealing clothing such as was the case in 01×14,  The Lost Generation  \- though this is not exclusively a Jewish custom. 

What is even more striking though, is the fact that Lucy never, ever utters the word ‘G-d’. Never calling the L-rd by any of His names is a Jewish practice, and is is founded on an understanding of the third of the Ten Commandments: “You shall not take His name in vain.” Although this verse is classically interpreted as referring to a senseless oath using G‑d’s name, the avoidance of saying G‑d’s name extends to all expressions, except prayer and Torah study.

Furthermore, Lucy’s occupation as a historian and educator and her perception of free will closely match with Jewish views on history and theology, in the way that one makes their own conclusions based on study, empirical evidence and research; being a scholar of G-d. This becomes increasingly clear in her conversations of light religious nature with Garcia Flynn, especially when she asks him: “What if [G-d] led you to me?” in 01×16,  The Red Scare , supporting the idea that G-d’s actions adhere to personal interpretation. 

##  Conclusion

There is a very real possibility that the character of Lucy Preston observes Judaism. Her ancestry shows strong signs of Jewish origins in the etymology of family names, as well as in their geographical descent. Lucy does not exhibit any behaviour that could specifically link her to any other religion. Moreover, she conducts herself in a way that can be explicitly connected to Judaism. 

All in all, I would like to end this piece by stressing that this is but a possibility, not a given factor, and as always when it comes to speculation, one can only be so sure of something without factual evidence. Religion is in itself a topic that varies from person to person, but I thank you for taking the time to let me explore this particular option with you.

Belle van S.,Vrije Universiteit Brussel

The author is a Dutch woman who was raised mixed Dutch Reformed and Presbyterian and now attends Roman Catholic church services. She identifies as Protestant. 

Brussels, Belgium, December 2018

#  Post-publication Addendum

I think it might be fair to point out that there is the pitfall of there being the longstanding stereotype that the Jewish man believes himself better and separate from others, and that this might seem to dilute the significance of Rittenhouse as a veiled white supremacist organization.

However, Judaism isn’t ‘just’ a religion, it’s a culture (which is part of why Jews don’t seek to actively convert people) and as Emma and Ethan have proven, there are those other than the straight white Christian male who have bought into the Rittenhouse point of view.

It makes sense to me that two Jewish families (Carol and Benjamin) would form a bond within the organization (perhaps part of why they had an affair) upon learning that they each have this cultural heritage; a cultural heritage that might not reflect the views their organization (or they themselves) touts.

And if one was so inclined to say Henry Wallace (Lucy’s adoptive father) was Jewish as well, that could have been one of the reasons Carol fell for him and left Rittenhouse, since being Jewish strikes me as something Cahill would wish to ignore or bury about his family history; just as Ethan buries his sexuality and Emma hides her feminist views.

It also strikes me that David Rittenhouse (and John his son) never touts a white supremacist belief--that is subtext given to us by the modern Rittenhouse. David himself, the founder, touts a supremacy of the rich and intellectual over the panicky, ignorant masses.

So it's not a stretch of logic to believe that David Rittenhouse founded the organization on the values of the rich and intelligent over others, and since the ruling class (who therefore had the most access to higher education) were Christian, white, and male, that morphed into a white supremacy organization (not that we should excuse David's abhorrent methods or his 1984/Big Brother philosophy).

And since Jews weren't viewed favorably in that time period, he would have been used to hiding his religion/culture since birth.

Therefore, it wouldn't have necessarily come up in his dealings with others and his political practices.

Addendum written by @letmetellyouaboutmyfeels/

United States of America, December 2018.

* * *

[1] Please note that I have not seen the movie ( The Miracle of Christmas ) and will not take it into consideration. 

[2] Throughout this work, the spelling ‘G-d’ is used, as well as ‘L-rd’, in accordance with the commandment in Deuteronomy 12:3-4 regarding the destruction of pagan altars.


End file.
